We went to Big Bend!

Our friends Amy and Stephen invited us to join them and a whole group to camp out at Big Bend over the 4th of July weekend. I haven’t been camping — like in a tent under the stars — since the one time I went with a friend’s family when I was about 10 and I don’t remember that being particularly fun. But since Rebecca really wanted to go I thought I’d give it a try.

Here’s a video and some photos (shot on my iPhone and GoPro) from the hike and our camp.

That evening we made pizzas on the grill — so awesome. And we’d hoped to do some stargazing but the clouds started rolling in. Then later that night it rained pretty hard; maybe two or three times. I was surprised that the tent kept us totally dry. Rebecca said, “that’s what it’s supposed to do.” “I know,” I said, “I just didn’t believe it actually would.” The clouds and rain became mist by the time we got up and the campsite looked beautiful.

The next day, Rebecca and I drove about an hour across the park to the Santa Elena Canyon. We had to hike just a short way but we also had to cross a little bit of water (thigh high). Here the Rio Grande is surrounded by 1500 ft. cliffs. It’s amazing. And there were people kayaking! I didn’t know you could do this. I’d love to come back just for that.

The views were so great I had to break out my Ricoh Theta S (360° camera). If you have cardboard VR viewer, open these in a new tab on your phone and have fun.

The first two are from Santa Elena Canyon. Click and drag to look around.

That night, the sky stayed clear and we saw an incredible sky full of stars. The Milky Way was just beautiful. We were even able to take the rain cover off the tent and sleep under that big sky. It was a pretty great experience. I still don’t think I’m interested in camping just for the sake of it but if it’s the best or only way to see some place like this, then I’d totally do it again.